Blackenstein, 1973.
Directed by William A. Levey.
Starring John Hart, Ivory Stone, Andrea King, Roosevelt Jackson, and Joe Du Sue.
SYNOPSIS:
After being wounded in Vietnam, Eddie is given a second chance at life by a DNA scientist who manages to reconstruct the wounded soldiers lost limbs. However, the results soon turn monstrous when a crazed lab assistant gives the resurrected veteran the wrong formula, causing havoc in the process.
One of the great things about Blaxploitation is that it could be mixed in with various other genres to create some wonderful blends. Mix it with a detective/cop film and you get Shaft. Mix it with a revenge action thriller you get Coffy or Foxy Brown. Mix it with spy flick you get…uh…Live and Let Die? My point is you can mix Blaxploitation with anything and you’re almost bound to get something interesting at the end of it, like the only Blaxploitation with a white Englishman as it’s hero. That film is bafflingly odd when you think about it.
Moving back on topic, as many of you might be aware, I’m a big horror fan, so you can imagine my joy when I got given a Blaxploitation horror film to take a look at. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the beloved vampire cult hit Blacula, instead, I got the rather crappy and forgotten failure that is Blackenstein.
Clearly made as a cheap cash in on the more successful Blacula, Blackenstein, despite its admittedly wonderful title fails to match its predecessor in terms plot, acting and execution.
The film’s plot is a slight change from Mary Shelley’s original tale of science gone wrong, offering us a story of a wounded war vet being given a second chance at having his blasted off limbs regrown, only for a mad scientist to boo that plan in the bollocks after being friend zoned into oblivion by the wounded soldiers fiancée. Perhaps the weirdest part of the story though, especially for a Blaxploitation film with a title like Blackenstein, is that the race plays virtually no part in the film’s story nor is there any thematic overtones dealing with race. The film is simply a cheap Frankenstein remake with a black man playing the monster that’s it. And it’s a bad Frankenstein remake to boot.
The acting on display is frankly terrible throughout with awkward dialogue being awkwardly delivered and performances so wooden only a lumberjack would enjoy them. Hope you enjoyed that joke – it’s more entertaining than anything in the film. Although I have to spotlight the performance of Roosevelt Jackson as mad assistant Malcomb (not a typo) who while having the acting range of a barn door, has a deep voice that stirs nothing but jealousy within me.
Also, not really a critique but more of a bit of trivia, but Joe Du Sue who plays the monster – he’s only in the film because writer/producer Frank R. Saletri used to be his lawyer. Guess this is one way of paying off your legal bills.
The pacing of the film is all over the place, starting off moving fairly quickly and having an almost “so bad it’s good” quality with its weird plot developments and bafflingly stupid dialogue. The second half of the film when Eddie becomes the titular Blackenstein, a monster with the shiniest shoes in the world, the film slows to a slow crawl that even Frankenstein’s monster at his most decomposed could outrun. Not even the guys at MST3K could make the film entertaining, it’s that boring and slow.
Also, this film has a laughably poor understanding of scientific fields, such as Dr Winifred Walker who is a physicist yet helps in performing surgery, which suggests the writer has confused physicist with a physician. Or Dr Stein (get it) who we should trust because his DNA research won him the Nobel Peace Prize, even though you don’t win the Peace Prize for medical breakthroughs, in fact, there is a whole separate Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine that many doctors have won since 1901.
If there are any positives that I can give this film it’s one thing; the music, sort of. Most of the music is lifted from the usual stock library that was raided by 50s B-movie directors back in the day and it’s the standard big brass numbers that make everything sound really damn dramatic. The music is also hilariously misplaced, with it making a rather mundane bedside chat sound like it’s the bedside chat to decide the fate of the world. On the plus side, we do get some honestly rather nice soul songs that pop up at various points, with the opening credits having a nice tune that tricks you into thinking the film might not be that bad.
Despite having a title that could have made for a fun little spin on the Frankenstein mythos, Blackenstein wastes it’s potential and instead gives us a cheap knock-off of the story that does virtually nothing new with the concept. The acting is terrible, the pacing is glacial and honestly left me struggling to stay awake and overall the entire production is a chore to endure. Skip this one and check out Blacula if you want to see Blaxploitation horror done right.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ / Movie: ★
Graeme Robertson
